The Morality Gang — Majoring In Minors

Why are we legislating and regulating private morality, while at the same time ignoring the much larger crisis of public morality in America?

The morality gang worries about fetuses, but not what happens to children after they’re born.

They and others like them have been cutting funding for child nutrition, health care for infants and their mothers, and schools.

The new House budget gets a big chunk of its savings cutting programs designed to help poor kids. What kind of priorities are these?

Meanwhile, the morality gang continues to battle same-sex marriage.

These “moralists” don’t want women to have control over their bodies or same-sex couples to marry, but they don’t give a hoot about billionaires taking over our democracy for personal gain or big bankers taking over our economy.

Three years ago, a right-wing group called “Citizens United” got the Supreme Court to open the floodgates to big money in politics by deciding corporations were “people” under the First Amendment. A staggering $12 billion was spent on election campaigns in 2012, affecting all levels of government. Much of it came from billionaires seeking fewer regulations, lower taxes, and weaker trade unions.

They didn’t completely succeed, but the billionaires established a beachhead for the midterm elections of 2014 and beyond. Yet where is the morality gang when it comes to these moves to take over our democracy?

Among the worst violators of public morality have been executives and traders on Wall Street. And still no major Wall Street executives have been held accountable for the wild betting that led to economic disaster in 2008. Attorney General Eric Holder now says the big banks are too big to prosecute.

Why doesn’t the morality gang complain about the rampant greed on the Street that’s brought the economy to its knees, wiping out the savings of millions of Americans — and seems intent on doing it again?

What people do in their bedrooms shouldn’t be the public’s business. Women should have rights over their own bodies. Same-sex couples should be allowed to marry.

But what powerful people do in their boardrooms is the public’s business. It’s time for our elected leaders — and all of us — to put our communal house in order and stop majoring in minors.